


Sweet Orchards, Smooth Cider

by Douxgivre



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Crying, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-26
Updated: 2012-10-26
Packaged: 2017-11-17 02:45:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/546787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Douxgivre/pseuds/Douxgivre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Scott is picking apples when an old friend stops by.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sweet Orchards, Smooth Cider

Scott pulled his hoodie in closer to him as a small shiver ripped from his spine. The air was vacant and sharp and he had a task. He and Stiles had moved to New England for school two years ago and it was always a nice change from the same old weather in California. 

They had made it a habit the day before school started each year to go apple picking in the orchards so Stiles could bake apple pies, and brew apple cider, and toss apple pancakes, and his mouth was drooling just thinking of Stiles' gorgeous sauces and thick jams and robust preserves. He was so lucky he had the son of a chef for a best friend. The basket in Scott's hand was less than halfway full, but the apples were big. 

Unfortunately, Stiles had work every day after classes all week so Scott volunteered to go alone. He sniffed around a particularly large tree, smelling out the ripest, strongest apples, covertly, of course, he didn't want anyone thinking he was weird. He scaled the tree quickly, snatched two or three of the best and hopped down in one smooth motion. He was at his peak performance because of the closeness of the harvest moon. 

Though more than a month out, each passing day he could feel himself becoming more and more restless just as he was the years previous. The seasonal change was raw made him restless, the kind that made him want to sprout a fur coat and howl as the first flakes of winter were borne.

Scott quickly shoved his free, freezing hand in his hoodie and continued browsing, the mere thought of winter making his wolf ecstatic and morose. He shook off the feeling and continued his hunt, his nose flaring every few seconds. It tickled with the smell of warm bodies and wood and 

wolf.

He stilled, gulping in a large breath silently, feeling his claws inching themselves out of his nailbeds, his teeth whetting.

"Getting sloppy McCall," A voice sweet and calm licked at his ear. His heart pounded against his ribcage. And then, the anxiousness faded and excitement took its place.

A laugh brewed in his chest and he dropped his bucket, throwing his arms around the one who caught him unawares.

He breathed in his friend's jacket and it wouldn't have been anyone else. He breathed out his name, more a sigh of contentment than anything.

"Isaac." His tan hand snaked itself into the messy hair of his packmate affectionately, gently pulling at it as he raised his head from Isaac's chest. 

"I thought you were in Rio with Derek working with Tammy's pack?"

"We were, well, we are still. I just..." He stopped and looked at the ground.

"Can we walk?" His eyes slipping back up to Scott's.

"If you don't mind stopping every once in a while to get the good apples" Scott responded, holding up his bucket and smiling coyly. Isaac grinned and nodded sidling up to Scott and they began a comfortable meander.

Every few minutes, bouts of conversation start, like:

"It's so amazing here, the leaves are like chameleons and everywhere. It's like the prettiest plague ever."

"Plague is definitely the right term, but pretty? You haven't seen them be brown moldy piles of guk on the sidewalks,"

or

"My wolf feels restless, does this always happen?"

"Yeah, it's the cold in conjunction with the Harvest Moon in October. It lets up the first time it snows."

They only stop and sit down when Scott's bucket is brimming with perfect apples, their elbows next to each other.

"I missed you," Isaac says softly. "It's so easy with you, talking you know," and pauses.

"It's comfortable to talk to you. Derek is still so broody and unapproachable." Isaac let out a chuckle with just an edge of bitterness, " You'd think spending two years with the guy would make him open him up to me more. But he blames himself for everything. It's why Stiles... well. Remember how that went? He moved to escape the memories again, but I think they are still suffocating him. Maybe he just needs to let the air back in.

"Yeah." Was Scott's reply. Two years in college didn't change the fact that when it came to people's emotions he was still any better at this sort of thing. 

Still, someone would have to be a huge idiot not to see that the blush on Isaac's cheeks wasn't just from the frequent stinging breezes or because the sun was now dripping down the horizon in hues of golden cider. His heartbeat was still fast, and he kept glancing at Scott like he was expecting him to bolt.

"You didn't come here to talk to me about Derek, did you Isaac?" Scott was looking away, playing with the handle on his bucket. 

Isaac's eyes too wandered away, to the proud-looking scarecrow a few rows to the left of them. He was silent for a couple minutes longer, gathering his thoughts, articulate and stoic, before managing; 

"It hurts, Scott." He didn't mean for it to sound so pathetic or desperate.

There was another pause as he tried to quench the flames igniting his vocal cords.

"I thought maybe putting twenty six hundred miles between us would numb this..." 

"Ache?" the word left Scott's mouth a second before he could catch it. "I know Isaac." He removed his hand from the sanctuary of his warm pocket and wound that arm around Isaac's shoulders, his forehead connecting to Isaac's cheek, the other arm snaking in front of his chest.

"I know," He sighed out.

" When you're away from the person you love, all the other things in the world; the things you loved become the things you hate the most because he's not there to love them with you."

"And then you get up and go through the motions because despite the fact they don't want you, and you know this and you tell it to yourself over and over before you go to bed and when you're alone and when you are fucking crying to your pillow. Despite that, you do it because as much pain as you may feel and as weak as you think you are; there's always that day where you see that person's picture, or you listen to that one voicemail you saved and it's like nothing ever happened. Like the tears never fell. Like maybe your story was still beginning." His voice cracks at the end because he didn't realize he was screaming into an empty orchard to the boy he's loved for almost five years. 

"I know Isaac." His grip so tight around him. His cheeks drenched from their tears.

"I'm scared of living without you Scott. I thought I would welcome a day where I felt nothing. It took me two years to realize that day would never come."

His voice was in pieces, so he tried to collect it, shivers running through the orchard and their bodies. A silence had just settled when he managed to croak out, "I can't even begin to apologize to you."

"You didn't do anything wrong."

"Except fall in love with the wrong person"

"No. You fell in love with the right person. He's perfect for you, he really is."

"But he'll never love me back."

Scott pauses, but a low whine forms in his throat "I want to Isaac."

Isaac lay quite for a moment, nodding once.

Isaac's hands reached up to tug at Scott's arms so they could stand. They wiped off their noses on their jackets and chuckled at how disheveled they both look.

"You can stay as long as you want you know," Scott said, hovering close to Isaac.

"Stiles is going to be baking enough food for twenty people over the next week and while I don't think it's possible for me to actually get fat, I may just break my werewolf powers by stuffing myself full."

Isaac was silent as they walked out of the orchard, out of the musk of sweet fruit and the hum of leaves with the wind; into a small shack where a girl was waiting by a register and a scale. 

"Will this be all?" She said meekly, her brown eyes cast down from the two.

"Yes"

She stopped there - only giving them the total. Her usual peppy, "You'll get 5% off your next purchase when you buy a jar of our delicious organic apple butter spread!" caught in her throat after hearing them out in the fields.

"Thank you, have a nice night"

Scott didn't even manage to say a 'thanks, you too' as he and Isaac let the door slam behind them, the little bell clanging loudly.

"Will you stay?" Scott asked hopeful, pleading.

Isaac didn't know what to say. He didn't know if there was anything else he could say.

"For a little while? You can even crash in my bed. It'll... it'll be like old times,"

Isaac wanted to turn away. He wanted to forget he ever came here, that he ever saw Scott. That he was reminded of how much Scott really did care for him, loved him even.  
He whispered, "Okay." And felt a quickly warming hand tangle with his.


End file.
